DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.1519#0076
PHIGALEIA. 45
Commission,* in which the obligations to Mr. Donaldson's work are admitted, as well as to that of the painter and
archaeologist, the accomplished Baron Stackelberg, who published the Frieze in 1829. No other justification of
the present publication need be given, with a recommendation to compare the plates and descriptions of the
respective works : and elaborate criticisms may thus be spared.
The editor himself was unfortunately on his professional travels in Sicily, during the second investigation,
but the well-known care of the conscientious and accomplished Haller, evinced in the elaborate and precious
documents of the ultimate examination, confided to him for publication, and which are still in his possession,
constitutes a guarantee of the accuracy of the result, which claims the fullest confidence. In preparing these
drawings for engraving some adjustments have been naturally suggested, which will be explained in their
proper places.
Pausanias in his topographical description of Arcadia, is the only historical authority whose statements we
are enabled to quote on the interesting remains of the Temple of Apollo Epicurius, at Phigaleia. The remoteness
of the edifice from the more inhabited parts of the Peloponnesus, and its position upon a lofty mountain, have
preserved these works of a rural people to the present day in a most surprising condition of beauty and order ;
while of the celebrated Temples of Argos, Tegea, and so many great cities, not one stone is found upon
another, and scarcely a fragment of them remains as testimony of what they once were. Had it not been for the
fury of the iconoclasts, the whole of the temple might have been preserved to this day. And that its partial
destruction was due to their hands and not to an earthquake is evident to the architect by the fact that while
the well-buttressed and iron-cramped walls of the cella have been destroyed, the lengthened peristyles, so
naturally weak from the want of lateral support, are still standing in almost their entire periphery; as indeed is
the case in most instances where the footmarks of the iconoclasts are to be traced.
Pausanias,f writing about a.d. 170, describes the city of Phigaleia as " surrounded by a lofty range, on the
left by the mount Cotylius, on the right by mount Elaion, which is still more lofty. The Cotylius is at the utmost
forty stadia from the city, and on it is a village called Bassae, where stands the Temple of Apollo Epicurius,
which is all in marble, even to the roof. Of all the temples in the Peloponnesus, this, after the Temple at
Tegea, is the most admirable, on account of the beauty of the marble, and the harmony of its proportions.
This surname has been given to Apollo, because he succoured the Phigaleians when they were attacked by
an epidemic sickness, just as the Athenians gave him the surname Alexicacos, because he delivered them also
from a malady which afflicted them. It was precisely at the epoch of the war between the Athenians and
the people of Peloponnesus J that the God caused this malady to cease amongst the Phigaleians; I find
the proof of this in the surname of Apollo, which has the same signification amongst all people, and from
the fact that Ictinus, the architect of this Temple of Phigaleia, flourished in the time of Pericles, and
constructed the Parthenon of Athens. I have already related that the statue of Apollo which was in this
temple is now in the public square of Megalopolis." §
History makes little mention of Phigaleia or of its magnificent temple. Rhianus, a poet of Thrace,
Stephanus Byzantinus, and Athenaeus, in their casual notices of the place, add nothing of interest or importance.
We know, however, that the Phigaleians entered warmly into the Achaean League, and the foundation of Megalo-
polis, to which city they presented their noble statue of the God ; but the extent and wealth of the district
is to be judged of by the generous enterprise exhibited in this splendid work, achieved, as we have said above, by
the assistance of the best foreign skill, viz., that of the Athenian Ictinus, and carried out in a true spirit of magni-
ficence, scarcely inferior to that of the Temple of Theseus at Athens. The position assigned to it most probably was
chosen to mark the spot where the deity first restored health to the people of Arcadia, as well as on account of its
conspicuous elevation, commanding all the south of the Peloponnesus and the Mediterranean Sea beyond.
Strabo, writing a.d. 25 (more than 150 years before Pausanias), gives a deplorable account of the state of the
once happy Arcadia. "As this country," says he, "is totally devastated, it would be useless to offer a long
description of it. Cities formerly celebrated, have been destroyed by continued wars ; those who cultivated
the lands have abandoned them since the epoch in which the greater part of the neighbouring towns united
themselves into one city, which was called Megalopolis ; and even this city is reduced at present to such a state,
as to justify the words of a comic poet, that ' the great city is nothing more than a great desert! "
*■ Expedition Scientifique de Moree, vol. iii. f Arcad., ch. 41. \ Viz., about 438 B.C. § Vid. supra, ch. 30.
N
Commission,* in which the obligations to Mr. Donaldson's work are admitted, as well as to that of the painter and
archaeologist, the accomplished Baron Stackelberg, who published the Frieze in 1829. No other justification of
the present publication need be given, with a recommendation to compare the plates and descriptions of the
respective works : and elaborate criticisms may thus be spared.
The editor himself was unfortunately on his professional travels in Sicily, during the second investigation,
but the well-known care of the conscientious and accomplished Haller, evinced in the elaborate and precious
documents of the ultimate examination, confided to him for publication, and which are still in his possession,
constitutes a guarantee of the accuracy of the result, which claims the fullest confidence. In preparing these
drawings for engraving some adjustments have been naturally suggested, which will be explained in their
proper places.
Pausanias in his topographical description of Arcadia, is the only historical authority whose statements we
are enabled to quote on the interesting remains of the Temple of Apollo Epicurius, at Phigaleia. The remoteness
of the edifice from the more inhabited parts of the Peloponnesus, and its position upon a lofty mountain, have
preserved these works of a rural people to the present day in a most surprising condition of beauty and order ;
while of the celebrated Temples of Argos, Tegea, and so many great cities, not one stone is found upon
another, and scarcely a fragment of them remains as testimony of what they once were. Had it not been for the
fury of the iconoclasts, the whole of the temple might have been preserved to this day. And that its partial
destruction was due to their hands and not to an earthquake is evident to the architect by the fact that while
the well-buttressed and iron-cramped walls of the cella have been destroyed, the lengthened peristyles, so
naturally weak from the want of lateral support, are still standing in almost their entire periphery; as indeed is
the case in most instances where the footmarks of the iconoclasts are to be traced.
Pausanias,f writing about a.d. 170, describes the city of Phigaleia as " surrounded by a lofty range, on the
left by the mount Cotylius, on the right by mount Elaion, which is still more lofty. The Cotylius is at the utmost
forty stadia from the city, and on it is a village called Bassae, where stands the Temple of Apollo Epicurius,
which is all in marble, even to the roof. Of all the temples in the Peloponnesus, this, after the Temple at
Tegea, is the most admirable, on account of the beauty of the marble, and the harmony of its proportions.
This surname has been given to Apollo, because he succoured the Phigaleians when they were attacked by
an epidemic sickness, just as the Athenians gave him the surname Alexicacos, because he delivered them also
from a malady which afflicted them. It was precisely at the epoch of the war between the Athenians and
the people of Peloponnesus J that the God caused this malady to cease amongst the Phigaleians; I find
the proof of this in the surname of Apollo, which has the same signification amongst all people, and from
the fact that Ictinus, the architect of this Temple of Phigaleia, flourished in the time of Pericles, and
constructed the Parthenon of Athens. I have already related that the statue of Apollo which was in this
temple is now in the public square of Megalopolis." §
History makes little mention of Phigaleia or of its magnificent temple. Rhianus, a poet of Thrace,
Stephanus Byzantinus, and Athenaeus, in their casual notices of the place, add nothing of interest or importance.
We know, however, that the Phigaleians entered warmly into the Achaean League, and the foundation of Megalo-
polis, to which city they presented their noble statue of the God ; but the extent and wealth of the district
is to be judged of by the generous enterprise exhibited in this splendid work, achieved, as we have said above, by
the assistance of the best foreign skill, viz., that of the Athenian Ictinus, and carried out in a true spirit of magni-
ficence, scarcely inferior to that of the Temple of Theseus at Athens. The position assigned to it most probably was
chosen to mark the spot where the deity first restored health to the people of Arcadia, as well as on account of its
conspicuous elevation, commanding all the south of the Peloponnesus and the Mediterranean Sea beyond.
Strabo, writing a.d. 25 (more than 150 years before Pausanias), gives a deplorable account of the state of the
once happy Arcadia. "As this country," says he, "is totally devastated, it would be useless to offer a long
description of it. Cities formerly celebrated, have been destroyed by continued wars ; those who cultivated
the lands have abandoned them since the epoch in which the greater part of the neighbouring towns united
themselves into one city, which was called Megalopolis ; and even this city is reduced at present to such a state,
as to justify the words of a comic poet, that ' the great city is nothing more than a great desert! "
*■ Expedition Scientifique de Moree, vol. iii. f Arcad., ch. 41. \ Viz., about 438 B.C. § Vid. supra, ch. 30.
N